bigh0rt wrote:Why more so than the others? I checked them all out and I couldn't pin point what you're seeing in that one.

Because I knew saying that would really get under your skin.

No I'm being serious here. The pictures are wild. I was just wondering if I missed something in that specific picture.

It is my understanding that those inland ponds that form after these type of events are pretty devastating because they stagnate rather quickly. Maybe there were one or two other pics that had that happen, too, but that particular picture had the most dramatic creation of a body of water that I noticed.

and then that happened ... and you know what. I live on the wrong side of the trade winds. oh crap!

SOMA, Japan – Japan's nuclear crisis deepened dramatically Tuesday. As safety officials sought desperately to avert catastrophe, the government said radioactive material leaking from reactors was enough to "impact human health" and the risk of more leaks was "very high."

In a nationally televised statement, Prime Minister Naoto Kan said that radiation has spread from four reactors of the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear plant in Fukushima province that was one of the hardest-hit in Friday's 9.0-magnitude earthquake and the ensuing tsunami.

He urged anyone within 19 miles (30 kilometers) of the plant to stay indoors or risk getting radiation sickness. "The level seems very high, and there is still a very high risk of more radiation coming out," Kan said.

"Now we are talking about levels that can damage human health. These are readings taken near the area where we believe the releases are happening. Far away, the levels should be lower," he said."Please do not go outside. Please stay indoors. Please close windows and make your homes airtight. Don't turn on ventilators. Please hang on your laundry indoors," he said."These are figures that potentially affect health, there is no mistake about that," he said.

Japan's meteorological agency reported one good sign. It said the prevailing wind in the area of the stricken plant was heading east into the Pacific, which would help carry away any radiation.

To clean up the Chernobyl site after the accident, the Soviet Union conscripted workers in proportion to the size of each of its republics, and developed a system to limit their exposure.

“They sent up to 600,000 people in to clean up the radioactive debris around the plant and build a sarcophagus,” said Dr. John Boice, an author of the study, a professor of medicine at Vanderbilt and the scientific director of the International Epidemiology Institute in Rockvillle, Md.

The workers, known as “liquidators,” were sent into contaminated zones for limited periods and pulled out when their radiation dose reached a certain level.

“To date there’s very little evidence for adverse effects,” Dr. Boice said. “It was pretty smart. A large number of people got a relatively small dose. There may be a small risk of leukemia, but that’s not conclusive.”